Matteo Bianchi

Calcific aortic valve disease is a cardiovascular condition that causes the progressive narrowing of the aortic valve opening, due to the growth of bone-like deposits over the aortic root. In the last decade, Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement (TAVR) has become the only lifesaving solution for patients that cannot tolerate the standard surgical valve replacement.
However, periprocedural complications, such as prosthesis’ migration, paravalvular regurgitation and cardiac conductions abnormalities, have been repeatedly reported, thus undermining the procedural outcome and limiting the expansion of TAVR into lower-risks patients.
My current research aims at evaluating the effect of different procedural parameters, such as initial valve positioning and balloon inflation volumes, on the device performance. Disparate clinical scenarios can be investigated through advanced numerical models, which could thereby become valuable tools to inform clinicians on the optimal deployment configuration for the specific patient.